CHICAGO | General Discussions

[ardecila]

Many of them are used as utilidors for the Loop. So you get telephone, gas, chilled water, fiber optic, etc stuffed in them taking up a lot of the available space. They're also pretty small to begin with, so unless you're planning on running these trains in them they wouldn't be much use for transit:


src

[sentinel]

Originally Posted by ardecila

Many of them are used as utilidors for the Loop. So you get telephone, gas, chilled water, fiber optic, etc stuffed in them taking up a lot of the available space. They're also pretty small to begin with, so unless you're planning on running these trains in them they wouldn't be much use for transit:


src

Oooooh that looks fun!!

[left of center]

Wow, that's some great info! Thanks for digging up (pun intended) the story on this!

That make sense that the mezzanine was demo'd since the northbound red line tracks would connect to the B37 station and had to cross over somehow. Rebuilding that mezzanine would not make sense from a financial standpoint since something still technically needs to be done with the 200 million "station" at the basement of B37.

This entire project really was and is a total quagmire. I think express trains to Midway might be the most feasible use of this station, since building a 3rd track around orange line stations would be far easier than doing the same on the blue line, since there's very little space to do so on elevated structure on Milwaukee, the Logan Square subway or the Kennedy median. Even with the orange line, you could only potentially easily do that for the stations between Midway and Halsted. East of Halsted and the orange line becomes elevated and the costs would go up.

Thanks a lot, Daley!

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by left of center

Wow, that's some great info! Thanks for digging up (pun intended) the story on this!

That make sense that the mezzanine was demo'd since the northbound red line tracks would connect to the B37 station and had to cross over somehow. Rebuilding that mezzanine would not make sense from a financial standpoint since something still technically needs to be done with the 200 million "station" at the basement of B37.

This entire project really was and is a total quagmire. I think express trains to Midway might be the most feasible use of this station, since building a 3rd track around orange line stations would be far easier than doing the same on the blue line, since there's very little space to do so on elevated structure on Milwaukee, the Logan Square subway or the Kennedy median. Even with the orange line, you could only potentially easily do that for the stations between Midway and Halsted. East of Halsted and the orange line becomes elevated and the costs would go up.

Thanks a lot, Daley!

Trips to Midway are already pretty fast, not sure there would be much benefit to an express that was marginally faster.

[harryc]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

Trips to Midway are already pretty fast, not sure there would be much benefit to an express that was marginally faster.

at the time IIRC this connection was presented as a mechanism for re-routing for trackwork and problems, not as a planned regular route.

[left of center]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

Trips to Midway are already pretty fast, not sure there would be much benefit to an express that was marginally faster.

Good point.

While there is definitely value in express trains to O'Hare, the blue line is a terrible alignment for doing that. Using existing rail lines, ala Metra's NCS or MD-W, would offer much better bang for the buck. It would still require a connection with the Blue Line coming out of O'Hare station, or better yet (although obviously more costly) running the line directly to the CTA O'Hare station itself. Good luck routing the line into B37 however, especially since there is a perfectly good downtown terminus for those lines at Union.

I think the best we can hope for with the B37 station is a non revenue rail connection between the blue and red, but good luck getting hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to get that operational, especially since there's an existing connection with the blue to the rest of the CTA network (Paulina Connector).

[Rizzo]

Thanks for sharing the diagram of Block 37. I had no idea how the alignment worked, considering photos of that area are confusing to understand.

Just further confirms my expectation it will never be used. If I were visiting Chicago as a tourist, I’d either take a rideshare or the blue line. Express service really interests us as Chicagoans because we are familiar with how long the ride is to and from O’hare. But visitors may opt for convenience and familiarity. They’ll memorize the blue line as that one route to get to and from downtown with a whole lot of interesting stops in between to explore. Unless one is really familiar with the layers of mass transit, which most of the general public in the US is not, they aren’t likely to mix services. It may only interest international visitors from places where complex mass transit systems exist.

I think there’s a diminishing market for it. Business professionals will take high end taxi services, many locals will take other trains or buses to the blue line and visitors will opt for single mode use, relying only on the L system instead of mixing in buses or express trains.

[Chi-Sky21]

Sell it to Musk for his starting point for hyperloop...boom, problemo solved

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by Chi-Sky21

Sell it to Musk for his starting point for hyperloop...boom, problemo solved

That doesn't work either, unless you dig two levels further down. The superstation "shell" is at the same level as the Red and Blue line tunnels.

But yes, I think part of Rahm's commitment to the Musk tunnel was to put this station shell into use somehow. The city really can't afford to pay the money back to the Feds. But it's been quiet on that front for the last few years, so maybe the Feds are gonna turn a blind eye to the colossal waste of their money.

[the urban politician]

^ Wow, what will the West Loop look like in 10 years?

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

^ Wow, what will the West Loop look like in 10 years?

Hopefully it will look cool in 10 years...a lot of tech boom fuel right now - 2 West Loop companies got $100M+ new funding each in the last 2 days. With the fact that residential can occur north of Lake St now...and all the proposals, it'll be crazy to see this area in 10 years.

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by marothisu

Hopefully it will look cool in 10 years...a lot of tech boom fuel right now - 2 West Loop companies got $100M+ new funding each in the last 2 days. With the fact that residential can occur north of Lake St now...and all the proposals, it'll be crazy to see this area in 10 years.

Tech people are not what I have in mind when I think of vibrancy. Sorry...

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Tech people are not what I have in mind when I think of vibrancy. Sorry...

That's because what your idea of tech and who works in the field is out of date. This type of thing is also new in Chicago. If you look at NYC today in various parts and look at some of the newer trendy/luxury stuff, a good portion has been born out of its tech boom there.

It's fine though - eventually you'll see your idea of this is a bit far behind the times.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Originally Posted by marothisu

That's because what your idea of tech and who works in the field is out of date. This type of thing is also new in Chicago. If you look at NYC today in various parts and look at some of the newer trendy/luxury stuff, a good portion has been born out of its tech boom there.

It's fine though - eventually you'll see your idea of this is a bit far behind the times.

My buddy who works for Salesforce as a developer and his girlfriend who works in sales at SAP spend more money on going out to high end restaurants and bars than anyone I know.

[harryc]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Tech people are not what I have in mind when I think of vibrancy. Sorry...

Hey somebody's got to keep Rossi's in business.

[Tom In Chicago]

Originally Posted by harryc

Hey somebody's got to keep Rossi's in business.

Hey, I resemble that remark!

. . .

[Randomguy34]

I've been keeping track of the amount of units proposed and U/C in Fulton Market from 2020-2021, thank to this map from a fellow forumer: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer...638113428&z=14

In just the past 2 years, for the census region bounded by Halsted, Madison, Ashland, and Kinzie, there have been 7,027 units. Assuming a household size of 1.5 ppl, this would be about 10,540 new residents. Even if there was a 50% slowdown in residential proposals over next 8 years, that would be 14,054 additional units on top of the existing 7,027. At the end of the decade, this would translate to over 31,000 new residents, with a density of almost 75,000 ppsm, by the end of the decade! For comparison, that's on par with the average density of Manhattan.

Do note, the downtown rental supply is still low while demand is high, and as Fulton St Co. have pointed out investors are hungry for Fulton Market. The area could honestly exceed this rough estimate by the end of the decade. Fulton Market could

[thegoatman]

Originally Posted by Randomguy34

I've been keeping track of the amount of units proposed and U/C in Fulton Market from 2020-2021, thank to this map from a fellow forumer: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer...638113428&z=14

In just the past 2 years, for the census region bounded by Halsted, Madison, Ashland, and Kinzie, there have been 7,027 units. Assuming a household size of 1.5 ppl, this would be about 10,540 new residents. Even if there was a 50% slowdown in residential proposals over next 8 years, that would be 14,054 additional units on top of the existing 7,027. At the end of the decade, this would translate to over 31,000 new residents, with a density of almost 75,000 ppsm, by the end of the decade! For comparison, that's on par with the average density of Manhattan.

Do note, the downtown rental supply is still low while demand is high, and as Fulton St Co. have pointed out investors are hungry for Fulton Market. The area could honestly exceed this rough estimate by the end of the decade. Fulton Market could

Crazy Chicago could have a neighborhood as dense as the ones in Manhattan. Great to see.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by thegoatman

Crazy Chicago could have a neighborhood as dense as the ones in Manhattan. Great to see.

I mean, there already are pockets that are as dense as Manhattan already..

* The area of South Loop between Roosevelt, 14th, Wabash, and the Metra tracks near LSD is now 131,932 ppsm as of the 2020 Census.

* Streeterville between Michigan, LSD, Ohio, and the River is about 95,000 ppsm as of the 2020 Census. Perhaps next Census it'll be over 100,000 ppsm

* For Gold Coast, the Census Tract between Division, State, Dearborn, and Chicago Ave is over 105K ppsm as of the 2020 census. The tract next to that between Chicago, Division, Wells, and Dearborn is about 76K ppsm too and there's room for growth there too in the next decade.

The tract between Chicago Ave, the river, State, and Dearborn was nearly 84K ppsm as of the 2020 Census. This includes One Chicago which just opened up a few months ago. So if we say the 812 (or so) units would be 90% occupied at 1.5 people per unit, then that alone would push the density over 100K ppsm for that.

* Near Printers Row in South Loop between Harrison, Wells, Roosevelt, and Clark is over 72,000 ppsm. This actually includes the land next to Roosevelt Collection on the river, so it's possible that it's over 80,000 or 90,000 ppsm already even with Dearborn Station nearby. This isn't even including the newly opened Imprint building there and very close by is Riverline, where there's multiple buildings now and probably not all counted in the 2020 Census and especially one with over 400 units U/C right now.

This will probably be over 100K ppsm pretty soon.

[thegoatman]

Originally Posted by marothisu

I mean, there already are pockets that are as dense as Manhattan already..

* The area of South Loop between Roosevelt, 14th, Wabash, and the Metra tracks near LSD is now 131,932 ppsm as of the 2020 Census.

* Streeterville between Michigan, LSD, Ohio, and the River is about 95,000 ppsm as of the 2020 Census. Perhaps next Census it'll be over 100,000 ppsm

* For Gold Coast, the Census Tract between Division, State, Dearborn, and Chicago Ave is over 105K ppsm as of the 2020 census. The tract next to that between Chicago, Division, Wells, and Dearborn is about 76K ppsm too and there's room for growth there too in the next decade.

The tract between Chicago Ave, the river, State, and Dearborn was nearly 84K ppsm as of the 2020 Census. This includes One Chicago which just opened up a few months ago. So if we say the 812 (or so) units would be 90% occupied at 1.5 people per unit, then that alone would push the density over 100K ppsm for that.

* Near Printers Row in South Loop between Harrison, Wells, Roosevelt, and Clark is over 72,000 ppsm. This actually includes the land next to Roosevelt Collection on the river, so it's possible that it's over 80,000 or 90,000 ppsm already even with Dearborn Station nearby. This isn't even including the newly opened Imprint building there and very close by is Riverline, where there's multiple buildings now and probably not all counted in the 2020 Census and especially one with over 400 units U/C right now.

This will probably be over 100K ppsm pretty soon.

Where is Wicker Park at? So many multi developments in that neighborhood. Reminds me of Williamsburg in Brooklyn.